


I've got one friend

by heartequals (savvygambols)



Category: Band of Brothers
Genre: Fic for Victory 2013, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-05-23
Updated: 2013-05-23
Packaged: 2017-12-12 17:30:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,857
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/814133
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/savvygambols/pseuds/heartequals
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Joe was angry at himself; Bill had to be angry at him too.</p>
            </blockquote>





	I've got one friend

**Author's Note:**

> Title from "Hospital Beds" by Cold War Kids. A gift for annjej76 for Fic For Victory!

The light-hearted moment passed quickly and all that was left in Joe was anger. Anger at himself, at the Germans, at Bill.

“You’re a fucking idiot,” said Joe.

“Shut the fuck up, Joe,” said Bill.

“You ain’t so bad off, boys,” said Doc Roe. “Ain’t bad at all.”

Joe and Bill didn’t speak even to say goodbye when they were split up and taken to the hospital in separate trucks.

 

;;

 

On the ride to the hospital, all Joe could think about was how it was his fault, how it would never have happened if…something. He didn’t know what that something was, but if something, anything, had just gone differently, he would be the only one injured. No one else. Just him. He didn’t even hardly care about himself, except for he did, except for he didn’t. It was just that Bill -- why the fuck did Bill have to be so heroic?

He didn’t cry about it but he kinda wanted to. The medic who rode with him administered another shot of morphine and said, “You’ll get to go home now – that ain’t so bad, now is it?”

“Fuck you,” said Joe, because there was nothing that wasn’t bad about having your leg blown off.

“Just saying,” said the medic but Joe passed out before he could properly reply.

 

;;

 

Lucky him; Wild Bill was laid out on the bed next to his when he woke up.

“Aw, dammit,” said Joe, angry and relieved at the same time.

“Hello to you too,” said Bill.

“You’re still a fucking idiot,” said Joe.

“And I’m still serious about you shutting the fuck up,” said Bill. “Got it?”

“Whatever,” said Joe. Bill looked like shit. His face was gaunt and pale and his limbs looked thin in his hospital robe. He looked weak in a way that he never had, never should, and probably never would again. The strongest part of him was the rounded stump of a leg that would always be a reminder of how fucking stupid he was for caring about Joe. Anger at him, Joe thought, would always be there, and anger in Bill was the strongest force there was.

He winced at the thought of what it would do to their relationship when Bill got better, if they would even have a relationship.

“There’s nothing you could’ve done,” Bill continued.

“You should’ve just left me,” said Joe. “Roe would’ve come sooner or later.”

“You’re a fucking idiot,” said Bill.

The rest of the day passed in an awkward, unhappy silence.

 

;;

 

The next day, Joe woke up and Bill was gone.

He tried not to panic. Bill had probably been shipped home. Bill was probably in surgery. Probably he’d pissed himself in the night and was taking a sponge bath now. Bill had to be somewhere. Hah, Bill was probably with one of the nurses, banging her in a supply closet, leg be damned. Bill had to be fine. His wound wasn’t that bad. It was just his leg. He wasn’t dead. He couldn’t be dead.

Joe panicked.

“Where’s Bill?” he demanded of the next nurse who passed by.

“Who?” asked the nurse. He looked harried, too busy to comfort a man whose best friend was missing. Joe didn’t care.

“Guarnere. G-u-a-r-n-e-r-e, Bill. Guy in the bed next to mine.”

“Oh, him,” said the nurse. “Surgery again. They took him out about an hour ago.”

He stiffened. “Again?”

“Wound like that won’t heal easily.” The nurse picked up his chart and blinked at it. “You’re next,” he informed him. “Up for surgery in an hour. Round two, I hope you’re ready.”

“Can’t be worse than the first time,” Joe said.

“Mmm,” he said and set down Joe’s chart. “Well, your friend will be out in another hour or so. Don’t worry about him -- he’s in the hands of the best doctors we’ve got. That leg wound will heal up right as rain. Yours too. How’s the pain?”

“Hurts,” he said honestly. “But what can a guy do?”

“It’ll hurt a lot more after surgery,” he said. “Excuse me, I have work to do.”

Joe wondered how angry Bill would be after this second round of surgery. Anger could be a thing that grew over time, he knew, and it would only get worse.

Wouldn’t be long before he stopped speaking to Joe altogether, Joe thought. But it was Bill’s fault for being a fucking idiot.

When they took Joe out for surgery, they wheeled him right past Bill in the corridor. Bill gave him a thumbs up. “Beat you,” he said, looking slightly dazed—the drugs for pain, Joe thought. “Guess I really am going home before you.”

Joe waved weakly. “See you later,” he said and the nurses wheeled him on.

 

;;

 

Time in the hospital passed quickly at first, but eventually there came a steady rhythm of waking up, eating, changing bandages, and lying on his back doing nothing all day. Bill was still in the bed next to him and nothing about him had changed – he was the same old Bill, wise-cracking and talking too much. The pain didn’t slow him down and neither, yet, had anger.

But it would come. Surely it would come. Joe tried to keep his spirits light but it was hard, knowing that any day now, it’d all come crashing down on him and Bill.

“This place is boring as hell,” said Bill one day. “I can’t wait to go home. If I make it home anyway. My damn leg won’t stop bleeding.”

“I’m sorry,” Joe tried, but Bill waved him off. “Shut the fuck up, Joe. How many times do I gotta tell you? It. Ain’t. Your. Fault.”

They fell silent for a bit. Joe wanted to believe him, he did, but it was all his fault, all his damn fault, that Bill lost a leg and was stuck in the hospital with him. If Bill died, it would be all his fault.

“How’s that leg of yours?” Bill asked finally.

“I don’t have to worry about gangrene anymore,” said Joe. “That’s something, right?”

A doctor appeared at the foot of their beds. “Gentlemen,” he said. “I’ve got some news for you. You aren’t headed home just yet, but you’re headed for the next best thing. England. How about that?”

Joe cheered. 

“All right!” Bill crowed. “Bring on them pretty English nurses!”

The doctor smiled. “Not so much fun. Recovery, fellas. You’ve got a long, hard road ahead of you.”

“Don’t matter,” said Bill. “Can’t be worse than the war.”

“That’s the spirit,” said the doctor. “Your paratroopers always look on the bright side of things.” He tapped his nose. “I always like treating paratroopers. Maybe because you all are so goddamn crazy to be jumping out of planes, but you always look at things like it isn’t so bad.”

“It ain’t,” said Bill. “I really ain’t.”

 

;;

 

They flew out to England separately but ended up in the same room anyway. Easy men stuck together no matter what, Joe thought. Bill still showed no sign of anger, but it was coming. It had to. Joe was angry at himself; Bill had to be angry at him too.

Bill was headed for his third round of surgery.

“I don’t see what the fuck I still got in me,” he whined. “Can’t they get all this shrapnel out? Surely it ain’t that hard.”

Joe was headed for his fourth round of surgery. “You got hit really bad.”

“I’m just saying. I don’t think it’s too much to expect these doctors to do their damn jobs.” Bill grimaced. “How long’s it gonna take for them to get us all patched up?”

Anger. There it was. Anger at the doctors, sure, but it would spill over to Joe in time.

They took Bill out and for a long time. Joe fell asleep before Bill got back and Bill was asleep in the morning when they took Joe out for surgery. 

When the drugs finally wore off and he woke up in a world of pain, Bill was waiting for him, fresh out of a doctor’s appointment. Their prognoses were, for the first time, good.

“You survived surgery,” said Bill.

“You survived your doctor’s appointment,” said Joe.

“Look at the two of us, surviving. Ain’t so bad, are we?”

“Not at all,” said Joe.

 

;;

 

“You know what’s great?” Bill said a couple days later. “Pissing don’t hurt anymore.” He looked jubilant. “I’m so goddamn dumb for letting that happen. Gonorrhea, I mean. I’m dumb. Don’t ever be me, Toye.”

Joe thought there wasn’t anything too bad about being Bill. Maybe the gonorrhea and the part where he was so goddamn stupid as to get his leg blown off trying to save a friend. But the rest of him was great. Bill was a good man.

“Except for being a fucking idiot,” he said, trying for cheerful and falling just short, “you aren’t too bad.”

Bill looked angry all of a sudden. “Joe. Toye. Brother. I’m saying this for the last time. It ain’t your fault. None of this is your fault. Stop blaming yourself. Stop looking like I’m about to bite your head off at any moment. Sure, I’m angry. But I don’t blame you.”

“But it is my fault,” said Joe. “We lost legs, Bill. You lost a leg trying to save me. You didn’t need to lose—” he started to choke up. “You didn’t need to save me. You could still be out there. That’s my fault. That’s all on me.”

“Your fault. Your fault? What, you blew off your leg on purpose? I blame the Germans, I blame Hitler. I don’t blame you.” Bill jabbed a finger at Joe. “Don’t blame yourself. You keep blaming yourself, I’m gonna get angry. I’m gonna get real angry. I don’t blame you. So don’t you blame yourself, not anymore, not ever. You hear me?”

“Yeah, I hear you,” said Joe.

“You’d have done the same,” said Bill. “You’d have done the goddamn same for me. So shut the fuck up about me being a fucking idiot before I take your damn head off.”

“I’ll try,” said Joe.

“No, you don’t try. You do. I ain’t so bad off and neither are you. Hitler won’t get us that easy. So just. Stop. Please. If it wasn’t you, it’d be someone else. Brothers in arms, ain’t we?”

“Yeah,” said Joe. “Yeah.”

“Don’t you blame yourself,” Bill repeated. “Or I’ll kill you, I swear I will. That’s me angry at you. Not for my leg or anything. For you being the goddamn idiot. Not me. You. You got it?”

“Yeah, I got it.”

“You sure? ‘Cause I ain’t so sure,” said Bill. 

“I got it,” Joe repeated. “I’m an idiot and you’re going to kill me.”

“That’s it,” said Bill but he was smiling again. “It sucks that you’ve lived this long only for me to have to murder you.”

“‘Here lies Joe Toye, wasted by his own best friend,’” Joe mocked.

“Basically,” said Bill. “It’s been good, Joe.” He pretended to shoot him.

Joe tried to smile and found that it wasn’t so hard after all.


End file.
